Democrats Democratas | |
|---|---|
 | |
| President | Antônio Carlos Magalhães Neto |
| Founded | 24 January 1985 (PFL) 28 March 2007 (DEM) |
| Dissolved | 8 February 2022 |
| Split from | Democratic Social Party |
| Merged into | Brazil Union |
| Headquarters | Senado Federal – Anexo I – 26º Andar, Sala 2602 – Brasília – DF |
| Youth wing | Juventude Democratas |
| Ideology | Liberal conservatism[1] Economic liberalism[2] Classical liberalism Christian democracy |
| Political position | Centre-right[3] |
| International affiliation | Centrist Democrat International[4] International Democrat Union[5] |
| Regional affiliation | Union of Latin American Parties[6] Christian Democrat Organization of America[7] |
| Colors | Blue, green, white |
| Slogan | "The Force of New Ideas" |
| TSE Identification Number | 25 |
The Democrats (Portuguese: Democratas, DEM) was a centre-right[8][9] political party in Brazil that merged with the Social Liberal Party to found the Brazil Union in 2021. It was founded in 1985 under the name of Liberal Front Party (Partido da Frente Liberal, PFL) from a dissidence of the defunct Democratic Social Party (PDS), successor to the National Renewal Alliance (ARENA), the official party during the military dictatorship of 1964–1985. It changed to its current name in 2007. The original name reflected the party's support of free market policies,[10] rather than the identification with international liberal parties. Instead, the party affiliated itself to the international federations of Christian-democratic (CDI) and conservative parties (IDU). The Democrats' identification number is 25 and its colors are green, blue, and white.
In October 2021, the party announced its merger with the Social Liberal Party into the new Brazil Union party.
YouTube Encyclopedic
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Chomsky: is Iran a threat? (UCL)
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Noam Chomsky - UCL Rickman Godlee Lecture 2011
Transcription
>> In Western policy making circles and among political commentators the Iranian threat is considered to pose the greatest danger to world order and hence, must be the primary focus of US foreign policy; Europe's trailing along politely as usual. This year is called the Year of Iran, because of the danger of that enormous threat, which does raise a question: what exactly is the Iranian threat? If you read the public commentary you don't get much of an answer, but there actually is an authoritative answer, which is ignored. The authoritative answer is provided by the regular reports to Congress by the Pentagon and US intelligence agencies that come every year, reports on the global security and of course, they include a section on Iran; the most recent was almost a year ago. The reports make it very clear that whatever the Iranian threat is, it's not military. So I'll quote, "Iran's military spending is relatively low compared to the rest of the region." In fact, it's less than a quarter of that of Saudi Arabia and minuscule as compared with the US, of course. Iran's military doctrine is strictly defensive, designed to slow an invasion and to force a diplomatic solution to hostilities. Iran has only limited capacity to project force beyond its borders. They, of course, bring up the nuclear option and say that "Iran's nuclear program and its willingness to keep open the possibility of developing nuclear weapons is a central part of its deterrent strategy." Well, the brutal clerical regime in Iran is undoubtedly a major threat to its own people - hardly outranks US allies in that regard - but the threat lies elsewhere and it's ominous. The one element of the threat is Iran's potential deterrent capacity; notice that that's an illegitimate exercise of sovereignty because it might interfere with US freedom of action in the region. And it's, of course, glaringly obvious why Iran would seek a deterrent capacity; just take a look at the disposition of forces in the region, including nuclear forces. Seven years ago one of Israel's leading military historians, Martin van Creveld, wrote that, "The world has witnessed how the United States attacked Iraq for, as it turned out, no reason at all." Had the Iranians not tried to build nuclear weapons they would be crazy, particularly when they're under constant threat by-- constant threat of attack by the United States, of course in violation of the UN Charter but, remember that that doesn't apply to the United States. Whether they are, in fact, developing a nuclear capability we don't really know but, perhaps so. Well, the Iranian threat as described in the documents and the reports goes beyond deterrents. Iran is also seeking to expand its influence in neighbouring countries and thus to destabilise the region, as it's called. Notice that when the US invade and occupies Iran's neighbours, that's stabilisation. When Iran tries to expand its influence, say commercial relations, with its neighbours, that's destabilisation. That is actually routine usage in foreign policy commentary so for-- sometimes it becomes almost comical. Here's prominent foreign policy analyst, James Chase, former Editor of Foreign Affairs, rather on the liberal side incidentally. He was properly using the term stability in its technical sense when he explained that in order to achieve stability in Chile, it was necessary to destabilise the country [Laughter] namely by overthrowing the elected government installing a vicious dictatorship. Sounds contradictory, but it isn't if you understand the technical meaning of the terms. Well, other concerns about Iran I have no time to go into. They're interesting to explore but, I think they simply show, underscore what the guiding doctrines are and their continuing status in imperial culture. That's very much in accord with the doctrines that were laid down by FDR's planners during the Second World War. The United States cannot tolerate any exercise of sovereignty that interferes with its global designs. And the United States and Europe are of course engaged in punishing Iran for its threat to stability and trying to get it to become a more civilised country, but it's useful to recall how isolated the US and Europe are. The non-aligned countries, which is most of the world, they have for years been vigorously supporting Iran's right to enrich uranium. Within the region, as I mentioned, the irrelevant public even strongly favours Iranian nuclear weapons. The major regional power, Turkey, voted against the latest US sanctions motion in the Security Council, along with Brazil, which is the most admired country of the South, as polls show. Turkey's disobedience led to sharp censure at that point, but not for the first time. Turkey was bitterly condemned in 2003 when the government committed a major crime: it followed the will of 95% of the population and refused to take part in the US-British invasion of Iraq and that demonstrated its very weak grasp of democracy, which [Laughter] led to its sanctions and sharp censure. It's the same today; after the 2010 Security Council misdeed, Turkey was warned by Obama's top diplomat on European affairs, Philip Gordon, that it must demonstrate its commitment to partnership with the West: follow orders in other words. A scholar with the Council on Foreign Relations asked, "How do we keep the Turks in their lane?" They're departing; something wrong; 'in their lane' means following orders like good democrats, our style democrats. Brazil's Lula was admonished in a New York Times headline. He was warned that his effort with Turkey to provide a solution to the uranium enrichment issue outside the framework of US power is a spot on the Brazilian leader's legacy. In brief, do what we say, that's your function. There's kind of an interesting side light to all of this, which has been effectively suppressed. The Iran-Turkey-Brazil deal had been approved in advance by President Obama, presumably on the assumption that it would fail and that would provide an ideological weapon against Iran. That was revealed by the British Foreign Office, which released the letter of support for it after Brazil was censured. When the effort succeeded, approval quickly turned to censure and Washington ran through a Security Council resolution, which was so weak that China readily signed and is now chastised for living up to the letter of the resolution, but not following Washington's unilateral directives, which go far beyond it.
History
PFL (1985–2007)
On January 24, 1985, DEM's direct predecessor, the Liberal Front Party (Partido da Frente Liberal – PFL), was founded by a dissident faction of the Democratic Social Party (PDS), which had been founded in 1980 as the successor of the National Renewal Alliance (ARENA), the former ruling party during the time of military dictatorship (1965–79). At the time, Brazil was under the effervescence that put an end to the military regime. In the previous year, a series of rallies known as Diretas Já gathered thousands of peoples in the streets of major cities to demand the direct election of the next President, as envisaged in the Dante de Oliveira amendment, which was pending approval in the Congress. On January 10, 1984, PDS rejected supporting this proposition, but a pro-Diretas Já faction emerged within the party a few days later. On April 25, 1984, the Congress, besieged by Army officials, voted the amendment. It did not reach the required quorum for approval, due to the absence of 112 deputies from PDS.
After the attempts to have a direct election failed, discussions about the presidential succession turned to the National Congress, which would elect the President indirectly in the following year. The pro-Diretas Já faction of PDS formed the Liberal Front, and decided to support PMDB's candidate Tancredo Neves against PDS's Paulo Maluf, the official candidate of the military regime. With the support of Aureliano Chaves, Marco Maciel, Antônio Carlos Magalhães, and Jorge Bornhausen, among other major dissidents from PDS, the Liberal Front named José Sarney as Neves' running mate for the 1985 presidential election. On January 15, 1985, the Neves/Sarney presidential ticket got 480 of the 686 votes available in the Congress (70% of the total). Nine days later, on January 24, 1985, the Liberal Front officially disbanded from PDS and formed the Liberal Front Party (PFL). With the death of Tancredo Neves on April 21, 1985, Sarney took office as president. Due to the same electoral law that forbade coalitions, Sarney was forced to join PMDB, of which he is still a member today. PFL, however, was a major ally of his government. His daughter, Roseana, was a member of PFL until 2006, when she was expelled from the party for supporting Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
In 1989, Aureliano Chaves was chosen as PFL's presidential candidate, but the weakness of his campaign made most leaders of the party to declare their support for National Reconstruction Party (PRN)'s candidate, Fernando Collor, himself a former member of ARENA, PDS, and PMDB. PFL's Senators, however, had masterminded the candidacy of businessman and television presenter Silvio Santos, a maneuver which had been hampered by the Superior Electoral Court. An ally of Collor in the runoff election against Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, PFL participated in his government, and, even after his impeachment, it participated in the coalition that supported Itamar Franco's government. From 1994 to 1998, PFL supported Fernando Henrique Cardoso and thus secured the post of vice-president with Marco Maciel. Prior to the 2002 election, an operation led by the Federal Police in Maranhão undermined the presidential candidacy of Roseana Sarney, leading to a rupture with the government.
Opposition (2002–2016)
In the legislative elections, on October 6, 2002, the party won 84 out of 513 seats in the Chamber of Deputies and 14 out of 54 seats in the Senate. After this election, which saw the rise of Lula of the PT as president, PFL became an opposition party for the first time ever since the 1964 coup. The party reorganized its alliance with Cardoso's PSDB to form the official opposition in the National Congress.
In the following general elections, held on October 1, 2006, the party won 65 seats in the Chamber of Deputies and 6 out of the 27 Senate seats up for election, making it the second largest party in the Senate. The party does not usually run presidential candidates, but does run gubernatorial candidates in several states. In the 2006 elections, the party lost several state governorships, but won the governorship of the Federal District. However, this governorship was later lost due to a corruption scandal in which Governor José Roberto Arruda was caught on tape receiving bribery from private companies.
In 2007, the party was refounded and adopted its current name.
In the 2010 elections, the party continued to suffer losses in the Parliament, losing 22 seats in the Chamber of Deputies, and 7 seats in the Senate. DEM was able to elect only two senators that year (Demóstentes Torres from Goiás, and José Agripino Maia from Rio Grande do Norte), for a total of 6, falling from the second largest party in the Senate to the fourth. Its longest-serving member, former Vice President Maciel, who had been first elected to the National Congress in 1966, was not re-elected.[11] On the other hand, DEM won the governorships of the states of Rio Grande do Norte and Santa Catarina, expanding its presence in state administrations.
The party lost over half of its votes when comparing the 2006 and 2010 Senate elections. In 2006, it had 21.6 million votes for the upper house, while in 2010 it had just 10.2 million votes. The decline was less sharp in the Chamber of Deputies elections, as it had 10.1 million votes in 2006, and 7.3 million in 2010. The decrease in DEM's voting was attributed to the rapid growth of the PT and its allies in the Northeast. In 1986, the party had won 36% of the votes for the Chamber in the Northeast, while in 2006 this was reduced to 17%.[12]
As a result of the decline in DEM's popularity, the party has considered merging with another major party, such as the Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB) or the Brazilian Social Democratic Party (PSDB). A possible merge with PMDB, however, has been rejected by most of DEM's leaders due to the fact that it is a member of the Lulista alliance in the National Congress and in most local level administrations. In 2011, it suffered another decline in its membership when São Paulo mayor Kassab founded the Social Democratic Party (PSD) and took prominent DEM members such as Senator Kátia Abreu, Santa Catarina governor Raimundo Colombo, and former vice-presidential candidate Indio da Costa with him. PSD has 52 federal deputies and 2 senators, most of them former DEM members.
Ideology
| This article is part of a series on |
| Conservatism in Brazil |
|---|
 |
The DEM claimed to be an advocate of ethics, democracy, the exercise of human rights, the market economy, and economic liberalism. It presented itself as a center-right party that supported laissez-faire capitalism.[13]
In 2006, the party's former president Jorge Bornhausen stated in an interview with Brazil's largest newsmagazine Veja, that the party should be considered centrist and socially liberal.[14] However, other party leaders classified it as "internationally, closest to Christian democracy".
According to political scientist Jairo Nicolau, the name change was intended to crown a process of modernization inside the party.[15] "DEM was launched as a modern right-wing party, with a new program, and aimed at the urban middle classes; a kind of Conservative Party of the UK", he says.[15] This, according to him, explains the departure of founding members and the rise of younger leaders.[15] For instance, Jorge Bornhausen, which had been a member of UDN, retired from the presidency of the party to give place to federal deputy Rodrigo Maia, son of César Maia.[12] The Santa Catarina section of the party was taken over by Bornhausen's own son, deputy Paulo Bornhausen.[12] In Bahia, ACM Neto took over the legacy of his grandfather, Antônio Carlos Magalhães.[12]
Internationally, the Democrats were affiliated with both the Centrist Democrat International and the International Democrat Union.[16][17]
Youth Democrats
Juventude Democratas was a nationwide doctrinal body of political action, of a political, cultural and social nature, part of the Democrats' organizational structure, with an indefinite duration. As a purpose, JDEM sought to disseminate the political doctrine adopted by the Democrats, in addition to encouraging the political participation of young people aiming at expanding the party's staff and training new leaders, supporting or promoting events, studies and research in the political, economic areas and social, aimed at disseminating, debating and discussing topics related to youth, their professional training and their development.[18]
Internationally, they were full members of the International Young Democrat Union.
National JDEM presidents:
- ACM Neto (1999–2001)
- João Roma Neto (2001–2007)
- Efraim Filho (2007–2011)
- Henrique Sartori (2011–2013)
- Hugo Neto (2013–2014)
- Bruno Kazuhiro (2014–)[19][20]
Electoral performance
Legislative elections
| Election | Chamber of Deputies | Federal Senate | Role in government | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Votes | % | Seats | +/– | Votes | % | Seats | +/– | ||
| 1986 | 8,374,709 | 17.70% | 118 / 487
|
New | N/A | N/A | 7 / 49
|
New | Coalition |
| 1990 | 5,026,474 | 12.41% | 83 / 502
|
 35
|
N/A | N/A | 8 / 31
|
 1
|
Coalition |
| 1994 | 5,873,370 | 12.85% | 89 / 513
|
6
|
13,014,066 | 13.58% | 11 / 54
|
3
|
Coalition |
| 1998 | 11,526,193 | 17.30% | 105 / 513
|
16
|
7,047,853 | 11.40% | 20 / 81
|
9
|
Coalition |
| 2002 | 11,706,253 | 13.38% | 84 / 513
|
21
|
28,408,415 | 18.49% | 19 / 81
|
1
|
Opposition |
| 2006 | 10,182,308 | 10.93% | 65 / 513
|
19
|
21,653,812 | 25.66% | 18 / 81
|
1
|
Opposition |
| 2010 | 7,301,171 | 7.56% | 43 / 513
|
22
|
10,225,883 | 6.00% | 6 / 81
|
12
|
Opposition |
| 2014 | 4,085,487 | 4.20% | 21 / 513
|
22
|
3,515,426 | 3.93% | 5 / 81
|
1
|
Opposition (2014–2016) |
| Coalition (2016–2018) | |||||||||
| 2018 | 4,581,162 | 4.66% | 29 / 513
|
8
|
9,218,658 | 5.38% | 7 / 81
|
2
|
Support |
| Sources: Georgetown University, Election Resources, Rio de Janeiro State University | |||||||||
Notable members
- ACM Neto, current party president, former mayor of Salvador, Bahia
- José Agripino, former senator by Rio Grande do Norte
- Ronaldo Caiado, governor of Goiás and former senator
- Mendonça Filho, party leader in the Chamber of Deputies from Pernambuco
- João Alves Filho, former mayor of Aracaju, Sergipe
- Marco Maciel, former Vice President
- Paulo Souto, former governor of Bahia
- Cesar Maia, former mayor of Rio de Janeiro
References
- ^ Kirby, Peadar (2003), Introduction to Latin America: Twenty-First Century Challenges, Sage, p. 157
- ^ "História do DEM" (in Portuguese). Archived from the original on May 18, 2020. Retrieved October 11, 2019.
- ^ Vallance, Monique M.; Crocitti, John J. (2012), "Democrats", Brazil Today, ABC-CLIO, p. 187
- ^ "Parties".
- ^ "Members | International Democrat Union". February 2018.
- ^ "Partidos Miembros". Archived from the original on March 31, 2022. Retrieved July 6, 2020.
- ^ "Partidos | ODCA.cl".
- ^ Maria Inês Nassif (August 19, 2010). "Guinada à direita custou votos a Serra". Vi o mundo. Viomundo.com.br. Retrieved November 10, 2010.
- ^ "Kassab quer comando do DEM". iG. Ultimosegundo.ig.com.br.
- ^ "Liberal Front Party (PFL)". Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
- ^ (in Portuguese) Oswald, Vivian. "Campeões de votos no passado, Marco Maciel, Tasso Jereissati e Arthur Virgílio não conseguem vaga". O Globo. October 4, 2010.
- ^ a b c d "Breve história do DEM, da ditadura a Arruda passando por FHC". Vermelho. February 17, 2010.
- ^ "Diretrizes do Democratas" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on September 21, 2018. Retrieved July 25, 2018.
- ^ Patury, Felipe and Carneiro, Marcelo. "Lula não se elege" Archived June 15, 2011, at the Wayback Machine. Veja. January 11, 2006.
- ^ a b c Nicolau, Nicolau. "O Declínio Inequívoco do PFL" Archived August 14, 2010, at the Wayback Machine. Papo Político. August 13, 2010.
- ^ Partidos Archivo, Centrist Democrat International, idc-cdi.org. Retrieved on November 10, 2015.
- ^ Member Parties Archived July 1, 2014, at the Wayback Machine, International Democrat International, www.idu.org. Retrieved on March 8, 2012
- ^ "Juventude Democratas". Archived from the original on August 23, 2017. Retrieved August 9, 2020.
- ^ "Juventude Democratas Nacional elects its new Executive Committee | Juventude Democratas". www.juventudedemocratas.org.br. Archived from the original on March 27, 2022. Retrieved July 26, 2018.
- ^ "Bruno Kazuhiro, columnist of DDR, is re-elected national president of JDEM – Diário do Rio". diariodorio.com. December 10, 2017. Retrieved July 26, 2018.
External links
- (in Portuguese) Democrats official website Archived August 17, 2010, at the Wayback Machine
This page was last edited on 22 April 2024, at 04:33